


Leaps of Faith are Easier Together

by hufflepirate



Category: Power Rangers (2017)
Genre: Aftermath of Drowning, Angst and Hurt/Comfort, Canon Autistic Character, Canon Temporary Character Death, Diving, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Gen, Holding Hands, Hurt/Comfort, Swimming, Team Bonding, Team Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-07-03
Updated: 2017-07-03
Packaged: 2018-11-22 16:22:41
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,873
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11383917
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hufflepirate/pseuds/hufflepirate
Summary: After everything is over, Billy finds himself at the edge of the cliff, ready for more training, but not ready to face a long fall into water after what Rita did to him.  Luckily, he has Jason and the others to help him find his way down.





	Leaps of Faith are Easier Together

**Author's Note:**

> I've never written an autistic character before, so PLEASE let me know if I've gotten something wrong! I love Billy, and I love that I've FINALLY seen a movie with an autistic character who reminds me of the autistic people I know in my own life, but I'm also allistic and working from research and experiences as a friend.

Billy stood at the edge of the cliff, shaking, and tried to remember back to when he didn't hate the thought of jumping down into the water. The ship was on the other side, the ship and their training pit, and their zords and everything. He just had to get through the water.

The first time he'd landed in the water at the bottom of the cliff, he'd felt relieved, maybe more than he'd ever been in his life until - until. He tried to focus on that feeling of relief, but then the other memories started trying to horn in and he couldn't - he couldn't.

"Ok," Billy muttered to himself, letting the vibrations in his throat calm him down. It felt good to let his mouth move, getting the words out.  "Ok, I'm not gonna think about that. I'm not gonna think about that. I'm gonna think about when we were down there, and we were glowing, and I was blue, and that was ok, even though blue's not my favorite color, and Zack said he was black, but I didn't know what he meant but now I do because we're Power Rangers and he's the black one and I'm the blue one but I'm also the Black one. That was exciting, glowing like that. I could do that again. I could glow again, I just don't want to - I just want to go train. Training is good and I-"

It wasn't enough. It wasn't enough. He thought about water and all he could think about was drowning. It was like the world was closing in on him and he hadn't even jumped yet. He paced back and forth, trying to calm himself down. The motion was good. It was good. It was helping. He couldn't melt down. He didn't want to. His mind spun. He was sinking. No! He wasn't. He was on the cliffside. He could feel the cliff under his feet as he paced.

His friends had jumped before him, just like that first big jump before he found the water. But he'd made that jump. "That's right I made it. I made it, but then I fell, but it was ok. And I made it."

Billy didn't notice Jason leaping back up out of the water until he caught a glimpse of him out of the corner of his eye.  Jason reached out and grabbed his shoulder.  His back stiffened, and Jason pulled his hand away again before he could shrug out of it.

"Hey, Billy, you ok?"

He should answer that. He should answer that, but his mouth was busy with other words and he wasn't sure how to anyway. "I fell and it was ok that time it was ok it will be ok it won't be like the other time and if it is they're there they won't let me drown I have arms and legs and I can move them my feet move my feet move and I have to _focus_ because I want to go train, but I have to go through the water and-"

"Oh."

Jason was talking again but 'Oh' wasn't even a word, it was just a sound, and Billy kept pacing. "I have to go through the water for training. I used to go look for things with dad and then I used to dig up here to dig deeper and now I train and training is down there and that's just where it is so I have to-"

Jason was in front of him, now, walking backward and trying to look him in the eye, and Billy took a deep breath, trying to stay calm even though Jason was looking at him. It was ok. It was _Jason_.

"You're right, Billy," Jason said, "You're right, we _won't_ let you drown."

It took Billy's brain a minute to catch up with that, to put the words in order and make them mean the same thing he'd just said himself, but when they made it, it helped. A little. Looking Jason in the eye seemed impossible, right at the moment, and holding himself together took too much energy to bother with trying for a glance at his face, but he could smile, and maybe that would be enough. His face responded sluggishly, but there it was, a smile as he looked at Jason's feet in front of him and kept pacing.

"You won't let me drown," he repeated, hitting the end of his pacing space and turning around. Jason scrambled to get back in front of him, walking backward again. "You won't let me drown, because you're my friends. But the reason I drowned was because you're my friends. But I'm still glad I have friends."

"Look, Billy, if you're not ready to do this, you don't have to. We won't be - I mean - it's ok."

Billy was almost ready to turn around again before the words made sense, but Jason kept quiet while his mouth kept moving and then he worked it out. But Jason was wrong. It wasn't ok. It wasn't ok, because he wanted to go. He wanted to go and to get through the water, and to come out the other side and train. With his friends. In the spaceship. Like superheroes.

He didn't realize that had made it out of his mouth, either, until Jason's voice said "Ok. Ok."

His friends weren't angry. Wouldn't be angry. Jason had said so. Jason didn't usually lie. Sometimes he was joking, but he didn't usually lie. Billy took a deep breath. Maybe it was ok then. He could feel himself calming down. The water would be bad, but the others weren't waiting. They weren't expecting him. They weren't pushing. It was just the water. Just the water. That was a manageable problem. Maybe. Almost.

Billy's feet stopped, and Jason took three more quick steps backward before he realized it. Billy watched his feet moving away and then coming closer again. Jason didn't touch him, but his skin felt like Jason was about to, and he didn't like that. He didn't think he liked it. When he'd come back to life, he'd liked it. Liked hugging his friends and getting patted on the shoulders.  But right now, he didn't.  Right now, his clothes were touching him, and the sun was on him, and he didn't like thinking Jason was about to touch him.

He looked up at Jason's face. His forehead was wrinkled, which meant any of a number of feelings but probably all bad ones.

"I'm sorry, Jason," he managed.

Jason smiled, and Billy's face mirrored him. He thought he wanted it to, probably.

"It's ok, Billy. I get it. If I'd been the one Rita - you know - I'd probably not be that excited about jumping, either."

Billy diligently made sense of that and then his brain grabbed onto a new idea. "What happened between?"

"Between-?"

Billy waved his hand at Jason, looking for the words. "Between! Between when I drowned and when I woke up. How did I get there?"

"Oh." Something was in Jason's face, but Billy was listening too hard to work it out, at the moment. "Yeah, we, uh - we tried to wake you up but you weren't - so we carried you. I don't know, uh -"

Jason was rubbing at the back of his neck, not making eye contact, and that was ok, because Billy didn't want eye contact yet. "I don't know what we thought was gonna happen or what we thought Zordon was gonna do but we couldn't - we couldn't just let it go. So we carried you. And we got here, and I - I took you and Kim helped and we jumped with you between us, so we could hold you, and then Zack and Trini came in after us and we pulled you through and then I -"

Whatever Jason was trying to say was hard for him to say, which meant it was hard for Billy understand, so Billy waved him quiet again, processing. He'd been in this water before, when he was dead. He'd been between Jason and Kim, and they'd made sure he made it out the other side.

"Hey, Billy, maybe this is silly but - do you want us to go together? Like that, I mean. I can get Kim. And the others."

Billy shook his head. That was too much pressure. They'd all be watching and expecting, and it would be too much.

"Ok! Ok, no. What about just us? Do you want to - I can come with you. I can do it with you."

That seemed ok.

"Yeah," he answered, "I want to go train. We should go together."

Jason stepped toward him, into his personal space, but that was ok, because he'd been expecting it. Then he stepped even closer, until they were chest-to-chest and almost touching, and that was too much. Billy stepped back.

Jason blushed, stepping back, too. "Sorry, I - I thought you meant like last time. I - do you want to hold hands and do it?"

Grabbing Jason's hand seemed easier than saying yes, and got even easier when Jason grabbed back, their hands meeting halfway between their bodies.

Jason squeezed Billy's hand reassuringly, face breaking out in a smile. "You ready?" he asked, raising an eyebrow.

Billy wasn't sure, but delaying wouldn't help, and Jason wouldn't let him drown, and if he didn't go now, he'd just stay here being afraid until he couldn't stand it anymore. He nodded.

They jumped together, and the feeling of being in the air, dropping down and down and down was familiar and almost made him feel the old excitement again - until he realized they were about to hit the water.

Billy squeezed Jason's hand as hard as he could, fear taking him over, but Jason didn't say anything or cry out and then they'd hit the water and Jason was dragging him up toward the surface for air.

It was harder than usual to swim without letting go of Jason's hand, but it was still easier than swimming while he was tied up too tightly to move, and it was still easier than the thought of being in the water by himself. The others weren't there, so they must already be training, but Jason was looking steadily at him instead of glancing down toward the ship. Billy kept treading water, and he kept breathing.

"You made it off the cliff," Jason said, still smiling.

"Yeah."

"Good job."

Billy really hoped that wasn't sarcasm. Sometimes 'good job' was sarcasm and he never knew how to tell. But this was Jason, so probably it wasn't. Maybe. Jason squeezed his hand again and he decided it wasn't sarcasm.

"Let me know when you're ready to go," Jason told him, and Billy thought probably Jason meant it. That was good.

When they stepped onto the ship to meet the others five minutes later, Billy was safe on the ground and had let go of Jason's hand. The others were a lot, after all that stress, but he thought they still liked him, probably, and they settled pretty quickly into the routines of training, and things were alright.

 

*****

 

The next day, Jason stopped at the edge of the cliff instead of charging over, and the rest of the team stopped with him. He held a hand out to Billy. "Wanna go together?"

Billy's heart raced. This was going to be one of those moments when people thought he was weird and said mean things.

Then it wasn't. "Oh, yeah, the jump?" Kim asked casually. "I can come too, if you want. It's still pretty intimidating. All that way down."

He didn't think she really meant that. She could _fly_ in her zord, and she'd dropped him and his triceratops out of the sky. But he thought probably she was lying for a reason, and she didn't seem mad. He hoped she wasn't mad. "Ok," he answered, not quite sure who he was saying it to, and then both Jason and Kim were holding his hands and after a second's thought, he decided that was ok.

They jumped together, and he thought he might not have squeezed quite as hard as last time in that moment right before the water, and then they pulled him up to the surface for a breather and when they let go of his hands, that was ok. He treaded water, ready to reach out and grab at them if they tried to leave him alone here, but they didn't. Zack and Trini landed in the water beside them and by the time they'd made it to the surface, too, he thought he might be able to swim to the bottom.

All four of his teammates looked at him, and it was too much, so he needed either to go or to tell _them_ to go, and going was easier. He grabbed for Jason's shirt, trying to get his attention, and Jason's hands reached back toward him, grabbing his.

"We should go together," Billy managed. But not holding hands, this time. He wanted Jason to be able to move. He wanted to be able to let go, if he decided it felt safe. He pulled his hand out of Jason's.

"Yeah," Jason answered, "Yeah, of course." The others vanished into the water, but Jason stayed behind, waiting. Billy grabbed a fistful of the back of Jason's shirt, and then they dove together.

 

*****

 

Trini's hands were tiny, like little baby hands and he was afraid he'd squash them if he squeezed too hard, but she laughed all the way down to the water and maybe he could make it those last few feet without crushing her, and then he did.

Zack was too much long limb and stood too close, maybe because if he didn't stand too close, those long arms would put him too far away. He wrapped himself all the way around Billy for the jump and it felt like a miracle that he could make it to the bottom with those long limbs wrapped around him and not feel like he was tied up, but Zack would never hurt him and he didn't. It was easier to let go of Zack in the water than it was other people sometimes, and Zack laughed when he pushed him away, making silly dolphin noises as he swam back out of Billy's space.

Jason didn't mind swimming with Billy's hand tangled in his clothes, but Kim preferred to grab his hand and haul him along herself, moving as fast as she could. Trini swam after him and promised not to let go of the back of his shirt and then she didn't.

A month and a half went by, and things got easier in bits and pieces, and he didn't know how he'd ended up with friends who were like this. He loved them a lot.

 

*****

 

Billy stood in the middle of the line, hands in front of him and not reaching out for anyone else's. His friends' eyes were on him, but they didn't feel like they were trapping him. He'd told them he was ready to go on his own. He'd told them he was ready to let go. They waited.

"Ok," he said, "On the count of five. I mean _on_ five, not five and then jump, because sometimes people say on the count of and then they jump next, and that's the next number, that's not the number they said. I say one, two, three, four, and then we jump on five, that's what I mean."

They nodded.

Billy took a deep breath.

"Ok. Each of the numbers will be two seconds apart. Because that's long enough to wait. But it'll be predictable. And then we'll go. On five. 'Cause I'm counting to five."

He didn't wait for a nod, this time.

"One." Maybe he wasn't ready. "Two." But he was counting - it was too late. "Three." He must be ready. "Four." He was counting.

"Five!" he shouted, louder than the other numbers, because they had to hear over the sound and feeling of jumping, but they must have heard, because they were falling beside him, and they were falling and they were falling and they were about to hit the water, but there was nothing for him to squeeze.

He hit the water, and for a moment he couldn't see, but he swam toward the surface and he knew his friends were around him even before he got there. They cheered as they surfaced.

It was his turn to laugh, this time. "We're only halfway! Let's go."

Kim was surprised, an eyebrow shooting up, but he didn't have time to look at the rest of them before he was swimming and they were too, diving down to the bottom to push through into the cave below.

When they landed, already too close together, he let them pull him into a celebratory hug, leaning into their touches and reaching out for shoulders and hands and arms. It was good to be back. And it was good to have gotten here by himself. And it was good to know he didn't have to. 

Maybe next time, he'd beat them all to the bottom.


End file.
